


American Soldier

by orphan_account



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst and Fluff and Smut, Army, Cheryl Blossom & Betty Cooper Friendship, Falling In Love, Jughead and Archie are soldiers, Pen Pals, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-08
Updated: 2019-10-13
Packaged: 2020-11-27 07:35:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,610
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20944676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Archie asks Betty to send letters to his friend Jughead, who is serving in the Army with him, becasue he feels bad that he never gets anything from home and she agrees. She thinks that he won't write back but he does sending them both on the road to finding something they never expected to in each other.





	1. Chapter 1

Betty woke early in the morning before the sun had even come up and she wanted more than anything to go back to bed but instead she got up and got dressed. She was working the early shift at Pop's alongside Veronica, who owned the business and could easily have picked a different time frame to work, but she liked working with Betty so she always scheduled their shifts at the same time. Betty usually worked the afternoon shift but one of the other waitresses had gotten the flu leaving them to scramble to cover her shifts as well so everyone's schedule had shifted a bit for the week.

When Betty finally made it to Pop's she found Veronica already inside with Rosie sitting in the pack and play in the corner of the diner with some toys around her that she was banging together. Rosie was Veronica and Archie's daughter, conceived near the end of their senior year, before they got married after graduation. Everyone in town assumed that they got married because Veronica was pregnant, though only Betty knew that she actually _was_ pregnant at the time of their marriage, but in reality they got married because Archie had enlisted and was going off for basic training. Their marriage allowed Veronica to collect military benefits to help take care of Rosie alongside the money she made from Pop's which she needed since her parents cut her off when they found out about the pregnancy.

Rosie was now over a year old and Archie was deployed somewhere in the middle east. Betty helped Veronica with Rosie when she could which was easy because they lived next door to each other. After her father had been arrested for killing people and her sister had run off to join some new wave cult, her mother had decided that she wanted to get away from all of the memories so she moved away from Riverdale and left the house to Betty. Archie had inherited the house next door to hers from his father when he'd passed away. They'd grown up together in those houses and now were left to raise their own families in them together, although Betty was far from starting her own family as she was perpetually single and Archie had already gotten a jump start on his.

"You look like you're still half asleep." Veronica said, knocking Betty out of her thoughts as she gave her friend a tired smile.

"I'm not used to getting up this early." She said with a shrug and Veronica laughed quietly.

"Lucky you." She said. "Rosie wakes up at five am sharp every day."

"You'd think she'd sleep more." Betty said. "Archie was always a master napper. I swear he could fall asleep anywhere."

"I know." Veronica said exasperatedly. "I don't know where she got her morning person personality from because we both hate mornings."

"Maybe the universe is trying to make you a morning person too." Betty teased as they began wiping down the tables.

"Getting up before the sun is a pain in the ass but seeing her face makes it slightly better." Veronica said, a soft smile on her face. "Maybe you're on to something."

"She is quite adorable." Betty agreed, reaching into the pack and play to ruffle her hair as she passed by. 

They made small talk until the first of the customers started trickling in as the sun finally rose from behind the horizon. The patrons were used to seeing Rosie in her pack and play in the corner as Veronica brought her to work with her all the time and the regulars stopped to play with her from time to time. Rosie loved other people and always had a smile for them which reminded Betty strongly of Archie when they were kids. Rosie looked much more like Veronica than she did Archie, with her olive complexion and dark hair, but her personality was very similar to his.

The morning breakfast rush had Betty and Veronica running around the diner taking orders and bringing food but it eventually slowed down a few hours later which left them with only a couple of tables still occupied. Betty scooped Rosie out of her pack and play and brought her to the counter while Veronica kept an eye on the tables still left. She began playing peek-a-boo with Rosie and her sweet giggles filled the diner making Betty smile. Seeing Rosie and playing with her made Betty ache for her own family. She was still young, only nineteen, so it wasn't like she was running out of time or anything but she knew what she wanted. She wanted a family with children running around and a husband to kiss her good morning and to cuddle up next to at night. She figured that it was the small town mentality in her but she still longed for it.

Veronica joined her at the counter not long after and brushed Rosie's hair off her forehead, readjusting the bow that held it in place as she did, before she leaned her elbows on the counter and propped her chin in her hand. She had her phone on the counter next to her and Betty knew that she was expecting a call from Archie sometime today, it was a Tuesday and Archie always got a call on Tuesdays. Betty knew it must be hard for Veronica to have him so far away and not knowing what was going on with him. She herself had had a few bad nights where she dreamed about her best friend in a flag draped coffin so she knew it was worse for Veronica.

Betty knew that she kept a framed picture of Archie by Rosie's crib at home and told her about him all the time. Archie had been home a few times for leave since she was born so she had met him and she knew who he was, she even pointed to his picture sometimes and called him 'dada', but Veronica seemed convinced that if she didn't talk about him then Rosie would forget about him. When the couple who had sat in the back corner of the diner left Betty moved to clean the table leaving Veronica with Rosie and her silent phone. She gathered the dirty dishes into the basket she had balanced on her hip and used a wet rag to wipe down the table before she moved to the kitchen and rinsed the dishes before she put them into the dishwasher and started it up.

As she stepped out of the kitchen Veronica's phone lit up with a number they could both tell from a glance was international so she took Rosie once more as Veronica answered. The big smile on her face was enough to let Betty know that it was Archie. She began playing with Rosie again, trying to tune out the conversation they were having to give Veronica the most privacy that she could in the small diner. She didn't expect it when Veronica touched her arm and held the phone out. She gave her a questioning look.

"He wants to talk to you." She said with a shrug. Betty took the phone and brought it up to her ear.

"Hey Arch, what's up?" She asked curiously.

_"Hey Betty." _He greeted before he cleared his throat. _"Look this might sound awkward but I was wondering if you could do something for me."_

"Sure, what do you need?" She asked.

_"Okay so I have this friend here. He's in my unit and he never gets anything from home, care packages, letters, nothing and I feel bad about it because he's a good guy."_ Archie began making Betty's brow furrow. _"Anyway, he's from Riverdale too, the south side, and I was hoping that maybe you'd write him a letter or something. I think he'd like that, if you could, I mean."_

"You want me to write a letter to some guy I've never even met?" She asked and Veronica gave her a questioning look. She held up her hand, indicating that she'd explain in a moment. "What would I even talk to him about Arch?"

_"I don't know, just tell him about what's been going on in Riverdale. Mundane things like festivals or special events, just anything. I honestly don't think he'd care about what it said, he'd just be happy to get anything at all." _Archie's voice held a note of pleading now and Betty sighed as she reached for a pen and her order pad. She could never refuse Archie when he pleaded.

"Okay fine. What's his name?" She asked.

_"Oh, you're gonna do it? Great!" _His voice was full of excitement and she could almost picture the sparkle in his eyes. _"His name is Forsythe Jones but he prefers to go by Jughead."_

"Really?" She asked at the ridiculous nickname.

_"He carries a family name from his father and grandfather and he doesn't exactly get along with either of them so he prefers not to use it." _Archie explained. _"Anyway, thanks for doing this Betts."_

"Of course Arch. I'm gonna give you back to Veronica now, I know you don't get a lot of time to talk." She said before handing the phone back to Veronica who began speaking again. She watched as Veronica paced the diner as she talked until an elderly couple came in and she grabbed Rosie off the counter and situated her on her hip as she moved to seat them. 

The old woman smiled at Rosie and spoke to her in a gentle voice as Betty placed menus in front of each of them earning a big smile. Betty took their drink orders before moving away from the table. She handed Rosie to Veronica as she passed her and brought the drinks back to the table as Veronica pressed the phone to Rosie's ear to let Archie talk to her for a minute. Betty kept herself busy at the counter with refilling the salt and pepper shakers as she waited for the couple to decide what they wanted for breakfast. Eventually they seemed to make up their mind and Betty wrote it down after tearing the top paper with Archie's friend's name on it off and slipping it into her pocket for later.

Veronica rejoined her a few minutes later with her phone tucked into her back pocket and began helping Betty with refilling the containers and taking them back to the tables. Rosie was once again in her pack and play with her toys surrounding her as she giggled and bashed them together. The rest of their shift passed quickly and the girls working the shift after them came in to take their place. Betty and Veronica both slipped on their coats and decided to take Rosie to the park since she had been cooped up in the pack and play for most of the day. They usually got her out more and let her roam around the diner as they worked but today had been super busy, likely because it wasn't their usual shift and they weren't used to the hectic mornings, so they wanted to let her have a little run around outside. 

She was only a year and a half so she couldn't do much running but she enjoyed it when they helped her slide down the slides and swung her in the swings so that was what they did. Betty was standing behind her and pushing her lightly in her swing as she and Veronica spoke quietly.

"So Archie wants you to write to someone then?" She asked and Betty shrugged lightly.

"He told me it was a guy in his unit who's from the south side of Riverdale." She told her. "Archie said that he never gets anything from home so he thought if I wrote to him it might cheer him up."

"What if he doesn't want you to write to him?" Veronica asked and Betty shrugged again.

"That could happen but I told Archie I'd write a letter so I will. If he doesn't write back then at least I tried." She said.

"Archie has such a soft heart." Veronica said fondly. "Only he would notice that somebody wasn't getting mail from home."

"He's a sweetheart." Betty agreed. "Not that he would ever admit to it."

They both laughed at the obvious truth of her words. Archie had always been one of the kindest and most gentle people she knew which is why it surprised both of them when he'd told them he was enlisting. He had explained his reasons to them once they had calmed down. He had done it to honor his father who had always done anything he could to help and protect others and enlisting was Archie's way of continuing that tradition. He said that he knew his father would be proud of him and neither of them could argue it after that. 

They stayed at the park for a little over an hour before they were all a bit chilled from the early fall weather. They made the trek back to Pop's to retrieve their cars and drove home. Betty waved at Veronica from her driveway before she went inside to make herself a cup of tea to warm her and slipped into pajamas despite it being the middle of the day as she settled on the couch to watch something on Netflix. She put something on to play in the background as she pulled out a notebook and began drafting a letter to Archie's friend. She knew that there was a chance that he wouldn't write her back and she could forget about this whole thing but she wasn't going to break her word to Archie so she would send a letter. Maybe Archie was right and it would make his friend feel better. She hoped so. 


	2. Chapter 2

Jughead was laying on his bunk in the barracks surrounded by the other soldiers in his unit as he tried to read a book and ignore the blistering heat that he could still feel even while he was inside when the mail came around. He ignored the sound of everyone shuffling around to move toward the mail cart to grab their letters and care packages from home knowing that he wasn't going to receive anything. His mother had ditched him with his alcoholic father and taken his little sister away and his aforementioned father was probably too far into a bottle to know what day it was so it wasn't likely that he'd remember to send a letter, hell he had probably already forgotten where Jughead was in the first place.

"Jones, mail." The voice broke him out of his thoughts and left him staring at the soldier who had stopped in front of him with the mail cart and was holding out a small box with an envelope taped to the top that he assumed had a letter inside. Jughead looked at him in confusion as he reached out to take it.

"Who sent me a letter?" He asked. The soldier shrugged before moving on to the rest of the room. Jughead stared down at the package in his hand for a long moment trying to figure out where it came from. The letter was sent from Riverdale but it didn't have a name to indicate who had sent it, it just had his own name on it as the recipient. He didn't recognize the handwriting on the front either but he shrugged and pulled the envelope from the box gently and ripped it open to read the letter. 

_ Dear Jughead,_

_ It seems weird to be writing this letter to you when we don't know each other and I'm not sure how to start this but I guess I'll explain how I got your name and go from there. My best friend is Archie Andrews, who from my knowledge is serving in the same unit as you, and he asked me to send you a letter. He's a bit nosy and has a big heart so of course he realized that you don't receive much from home and he thought that it would make you feel better if you did so here it is. If you don't want anything to do with this then I totally understand but I figure if you're up for it that we could be great pen pals. Anyway, Archie tells me that you grew up in Riverdale as well so you and I have likely met each other in passing at some point, though I doubt that either of us remembers it, but since you are from here then I'll update you on some of the comings and goings._

_ First things first, the town is setting up for the annual fall festival which should be a lot of fun. There's going to be hay rides and baking competitions along with other fun games and there will also be booths set up where people can sell their homemade snacks and other things. I think Rosie, who is Archie's daughter in case you didn't know, is going to enjoy the festival more than anyone else but that's mainly because she'll be allowed to have all kinds of sweets to try. The leaves have already started to turn here which always makes me smile when I see them. I know it technically means that they're dying but what a beautiful death it is. Fall is truly my favorite time of year, I'm curious what yours is so maybe you can tell me if you decide to write back._

_ Archie also told me that you're from the south side of town so I'll give you some updates about that as well. Veronica and I have set up a fundraiser that will run during the festival to benefit the local children in that part of town as we plan to use the money to build them a playground and also buy new school books for Southside Elementary. There are also plans in the works to fix up an old boxing gym and convert it into a community center to help the kids and give them a place to go. Along with the community center is the plan to set up a fund to give one scholarship a year to a kid on the south side that shows promise. I think it's going to benefit so many people and I'm glad that the town is finally beginning to show their support for the south side after so many years of animosity._

_ I don't have anything else to report right now but I hope this letter reaches you well. In the box that I've attached this letter to I've sent some cookies that I baked, I hope the got to their destination without being ruined and I hope that you like them. And don't let Archie's puppy dog eyes scam you out of them because I sent him his own batch. I hope to hear from you soon. Maybe you can ask me some questions so I'll know what information from home that you actually care about and I'll answer them to the best of my abilities. Also, sorry the letter is so short, I wasn't actually sure what to write about but I hope that this has at least made you smile._

_ Sincerely,_

_ Betty Cooper_

_P.S. Yes that Betty Cooper, the one with the serial killer dad and crazy cult joining sister. Believe me I understand if this is the thing that makes you opt out of the whole pen pal thing. Also the reason that I didn't put my name on the envelope, I thought you wouldn't open it if you saw the name._

Jughead sat the letter to the side as he opened the box that it had come with and found a tupperware bowl inside that had to have at least two dozen cookies in it. The were simple chocolate chip cookies but it made him smile anyway as he opened it and popped one in his mouth. It was slightly crumbled and the chocolate had melted from the heat but it was still delicious. 

He of course knew who Betty Cooper was, anyone who grew up in Riverdale knew who she was, she had been the one to bring her own father to justice. The local police had no leads on the mysterious killer who called himself the blackhood and the investigation had been at a standstill until the call came from Betty Cooper herself, who had knocked out her father when he was trying to kill her and her mother and had tied him up before calling the police. When it had been reported in the paper Jughead could remember finding it strange that there was no picture to accompany the articleuntil it had been stated in fine print that Betty herself had refused to comment or be photographed.

Jughead could understand wanting to remain as anonymous as possible, even in the small town they'd grown up in where most everyone knew everyone else, so he'd understood why she refused the picture. He also knew that it was likely that she just wanted to put it behind her and move on which was sometimes hard in a place like Riverdale where gossip was the lifeblood of it's people. Jughead himself had done everything possible to avoid being noticed mainly because he didn't want people to place their own assumptions on him.

Jughead glanced up when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye and found Archie standing next to his bunk. Jughead raised and eyebrow at him and placed the tupperware bowl back into the box.

"So, I see Betty wrote to you then." He said, trying to hard to keep his voice casual but Jughead could see the happiness in his eyes.

"You know you didn't have to ask her to do that, right?" Jughead asked him. "I'm fine Arch."

"I just thought that you'd like to have someone from home to talk to and keep you up to date instead of hearing it second hand from me after I've talked to Veronica." He said quietly.

"It is nice Archie." Jughead said, not wanting to seem ungrateful or, god forbid, hurt Archie's feelings. Archie smiled.

"Are you gonna write back?" He asked and Jughead shrugged.

"Maybe." He said as he studied his friend. "It's strange, I knew most people from Riverdale by sight because they all usually came into Pop's while I was there but for some reason I can't place Betty. I know who she is obviously, everyone does, but I can't picture her."

"Oh, maybe this will help." Archie exclaimed as he pulled his wallet out an shuffled a few things around before he pulled out a small picture. Jughead raised an eyebrow at him.

"You keep a picture of your female best friend in your wallet? How does your wife feel about that?" Jughead asked. Archie rolled his eyes at him.

"She's fine with it. She and Betty are best friends too and she knows that Betty and I have known each other since we were in diapers." He said as he handed over the picture. "Honestly she's like family. V knows that."

Jughead shrugged as he took the picture from Archie's fingers and turned it over to see the girl on the other side of it. Her blonde hair was falling freely around her shoulders and she had a big smile on her face like she was seconds away from laughing when the picture had been snapped. Her green eyes were filled with genuine happiness and it was that that made Jughead remember her as flashes of images ran through his mind. A little girl with drinking an orange freeze with her father in a booth, a preteen trailing after her older sister as they picked up a to-go order, and finally a teenager with a perfect ponytail sitting in a booth with Archie as they sipped on milkshakes. He could remember a thousand times seeing her and Archie in a booth together to be later joined by a small latina girl that Jughead knew from pictures was Archie's wife now.

"Yeah." He said softly as he handed the picture back to Archie. "I remember her now. You two were literally always together at Pop's, I honestly thought that you two were dating until I began to notice Veronica in the picture."

"Betty and I never dated." Archie said with a slight shrug. "Her family.....well, lets just say they were a lot. She was my next door neighbor and every time things got a little to much at home she'd come over to my house and I'd take her to Pop's to cheer her up. It sort of became a tradition."

"I get wanting to escape your family." Jughead said with a shrug. "It's one of the reason's I enlisted."

"Right." Archie said softly. "Anyway, if you do write her back try not to bring up her father, she doesn't like to talk about it. I know that you love that whole serial killer psychology thing but she is not the person to bother with it."

"I wouldn't have brought it up anyway Arch." Jughead said. "Contrary to popular belief I do actually have some social graces."

"Sorry." Archie said sheepishly before his eyes fell to the box that was still sitting next to Jughead's knee and Jughead smirked.

"Don't even think about asking." He said, picking up the letter and waving it around. "Betty already informed me that you have your own."

"Sneaky witch." Archie said but his voice was soft and he was smiling as he rolled his eyes. "Fine, I'll leave you alone."

"Hey Arch." Jughead called softly, making the other boy pause in his steps as he glanced over his shoulder to look at him. "Thank you, for thinking of me."

"Of course." He nodded before leaving the room completely. 

Jughead folded the letter up and placed it back into the envelope before he placed it into the box along with the cookies before he laid back on the bunk once again. He knew logically that Betty had only written a letter to him because Archie had asked her to but he had to admit that it was nice to get something from home instead of sitting around while everyone else was showered with letters and other items. He liked having something to open with everyone else so he decided that he would write back to her in hopes that she was serious about the pen pal thing.

He knew that she felt like she'd taken a risk when she'd told him about her father. It was likely that people in town were still gossiping about it years after it had happened because it was one of the most interesting thing to happen in their town in a long time. He knew she didn't actually expect him to write back because of it even though she had mentioned hearing from him in the letter itself but he knew better than most that the sins of the father carried some serious weight and he wasn't going to judge her for the actions of hers. She seemed nice enough in her letter and from what he remembered of her she had always been kind to everyone so he figured that it couldn't hurt. He was actually interested in receiving another letter from her just to see what she'd say. It was nice to have someone on the other side, even if they'd never met before.


End file.
